There’s
an old saying that “whatever goes up must come down.” And this is true for doing
overhead press barbell, dumbbell, or kettlebell exercises. I’m a fan of overhead press work and have put
it, again, on my short list of go to exercises.
This
isn’t the first time in my middle-age man fitness training journey that I’ve had
a focus and fascination with overhead training.
In my former training life, I did a couple semesters of Olympic weightlifting
training, the snatch and clean and jerk lifts.
While
doing so, I understood that there undoubtedly were lightweight members of the Chinese
women’s Olympic weightlifting team hoisting considerably more overhead than I was
doing on my best training days. Nonetheless,
I was able to increase my lifts, peaking with best effort lifts of 160 lbs. for
the snatch and 185 lbs. for the clean and jerk.
Later,
I moved on the other things including a semester of the StrongLifts barbell training program. There, my best overhead effort was a barbell
press of 175 lbs. I wish I had a video
of that lift, but I don’t.
These
days, almost a decade later, I’m at it again with overhead work, doing single
and double kettlebells snatch and overhead presses, either standalone efforts
or as part of a kettlebell complex or chain.
I
like and thrive doing the overhead stuff. Someone once told me that when I
exercise, don’t lay when I can sit, don’t sit when I can stand, and lift
something heavy overhead. Single and double kettlebell snatch and
overhead press work are perfect for doing just that.
I’m
using the two pair sets of kettlebells I own for my overhead work, a pair of
20kg kettlebells and a pair of 24kg kettlebells. Rather than go out and add to my collection
at this point, I’ll focus on progressive resistance improvements by increasing
the rep volume I do, either as a single set maximum reps effort or total reps completed
within a given time.
Go
north middle-age man, your journey continues.
Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum
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